Exclusive interview: Why Monaco will continue to be successful despite selling over £300m worth of talent

Monaco did not expect to sell Kylian Mbappe last summer. They did not expect any club to come close to their valuation – an astronomical €180 million (£162m) – for the 18 year-old, but then Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid both did just that in what turned out to be an astonishing transfer window. And for the French champions, in particular.

Benjamin Mendy and Bernardo Silva to Manchester City, Tiemoue Bakayoko to Chelsea and Mbappe to PSG. It was a new ‘world record’ for transfer fees for one club. “€360m (£321m), or thereabouts,” says Vadim Vasilyev, Monaco’s vice-president, when asked how much had been brought in. “And it could have been more,” he adds.

Offers for Thomas Lemar from Liverpool and then Arsenal, who bid €100m (£90m), were rejected and Monaco also refused to sell Fabinho. They could – if they had wanted – have banked €500m (£446m) in one transfer window alone, as Vasilyev acknowledges. “Absolutely, it could have been close to half a billion,” he says, without batting an eyelid.

It is just over four months since we last met, in Paris, for an interview just hours after Monaco had won the French league title – for the first time in 17 years – in a season in which they went through the qualifying rounds to the semi-finals of the Champions League with an exciting, young, attacking team. Then Vasilyev had predicted there would be “quite a few” bids for Monaco’s players and it would be a battle to stop the team from breaking up.

In the end it was not just a few vultures circling but a whole flock, although while Vasilyev admits “clubs are coming after us all the time” there is a simple premise that he adheres to which makes Monaco economically viable. “We understand that we are basically a selling club, and we accept that,” he says.

We meet in Vasilyev’s office inside the Stade Louis II. There is, behind his desk, a framed Thierry Henry No 12 Monaco shirt, a reminder that there has always been a history of developing players and the 52-year-old Russian, who runs the club on a day-to-day basis, adds: “The likes of Thierry Henry, David Trezeguet, Lilian Thuram came out of this academy so what has happened with him (Mbappe) re-confirms our top status.”

It has to be that way. To understand, fully, the Monaco story it is best to rewind to December 2011. Then the club was in the French second division but was bought by Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev, a petro-chemical magnate, who lavished money on it. Hundreds of millions were spent with Radamel Falcao, James Rodriguez and Joao Moutinho signed as Monaco made waves.

Vadim Vasilyev inside his Monaco officeCredit:
EPA

But then they quickly fell foul of Uefa’s Financial Fair Play rules because they did not have the commercial revenues to balance the books while, at the same time, Rybolovlev could not carry on spending.

So Monaco have become self-sufficient and sustainable. They have worked the transfer market to make money and still be successful by selling the idea to talented young players – such as Youri Tielemans, who they bought from Anderlecht for £21.6m to replace Bernardo – that they can go there, play at a high level and move on. From the transfer fees, €50m is now being invested in the training ground and €100m to upgrade the stadium.

“It’s not about making so much money,” Vasilyev explains. “We want to be successful and this is just a consequence of being successful. Because what is different is we have very limited resources, revenues, compared to Premier League clubs. I mean, in ticketing, we make in one domestic season the same as Arsenal makes in one game. The bottom team of the Premier League makes almost three times more than we do being on the top (of the French league) as champions. And we want to be competitive on a European level, which we are, so we have to be different and that means we have to be successful in transfers.”

So what about last summer? “I knew there would be interest but I probably under-estimated the interest,” Vasilyev says. But he planned. Deals for Tielemans and Soualiho Meite, from Lille, were lined up to plug the midfield gap while the Brazilian full-back Jorge was signed to cover for Mendy. All three are, Vasilyev believes, future stars.

“Like when we understood the Mbappe deal was very close we really accelerated for Keita Balde (from Lazio) but it’s not easy,” he says. Even so, the Mbappe move went down to the wire with, finally, an unusual season-long loan agreed and will be followed by the second-highest fee ever after Neymar’s world-record €222m transfer to PSG.

“The price for Mbappe was fixed. It was fixed because everyone thought it was not possible. We didn’t really want to part with him,” Vasilyev says. “We knew it had to be something extra, extraordinary. There was interest but it did not seem likely.”

Kylian Mbappe has teamed up with Neymar at PSGCredit:
AFP

It was between Real Madrid and PSG – “the other clubs were really circling around, talking to us but the only other one that became public was this one (Madrid),” Vasilyev says – with Mbappe’s desire to return to Paris sealing it.

“The boy wanted to go. It’s a great project, I have to admit that, and it’s a club that aspires to win the Champions League, and playing alongside Neymar made it even more attractive for him,” Vasilyev says. “So as long as it (the loan deal) was legal and we were not breaking any rules we said ‘ok, we accept our player wants to join this team’. Initially we didn’t want that to happen.

“Me, personally, I didn’t see him in Paris but I listened to all his arguments and tried to understand his feelings. He was born in Paris, he comes from Paris and he deemed it was too early for him to leave France which was also an argument. So we decided if the conditions were roughly on the same level as the other offer we have then, okay, we will let him go. But it was hard. He’s really incredible. I’m sure he will be a future Ballon D’Or (winner).”

Kylian Mbappe is already making waves at PSGCredit:
AFP

Interestingly, Vasilyev, despite the transfer successes, says he is fully in favour of closing the window early. “We care about the game. If we do that we should stop the transfer market before the domestic leagues start,” he says. “You saw the stress with Coutinho and Barcelona, and we had it with Mbappe, Lemar, Fabinho, and it has nothing to do with fair sports competition. The Premier League has made its decision (to close the window early) but it has to be across the market and it’s up to Fifa to make a stance. Talking to my colleagues across the different leagues, there is a consensus. It’s got out of hand. It’s crazy.”

Does part of him wish, given Monaco’s on-field success, that he could have just kept last season’s team together? “It’s true,” Vasilyev says. “It’s a mixed feeling. It’s not about transfer records but at the same time I know that letting players go is part of our model so that other players will choose Monaco and once they know where our players will eventually go then you know when they have a choice they will choose us.

“It’s not because of the money it’s because they know this is the perfect club where if they do well, then they can reach their dream of playing for a top club. Tielemans or Keita Balde this summer could have chosen a bigger club but they know our selling point.”

Even so, the number of changes can be unsettling and, on Tuesday, Monaco are at home to Besiktas knowing they already need a win if they are to get through their Champions League group. “It’s a turning game,” Vasilyev says. “We will do our utmost because it’s our ambition to compete on a European level. We know we cannot be successful every year but we will do everything that it takes.”